


The Queen Has Been Overthrown

by sazzafraz



Series: More Seats Reserved For Heroes [2]
Category: Captain America (2011), Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (2012), Thor (2011)
Genre: F/F, F/M, M/M, and also ideas lifted from inception, inception level mind fuckery, ya'll should know i thought up half of this while reading siken
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-04-01
Updated: 2012-05-30
Packaged: 2017-11-02 20:53:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/373226
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sazzafraz/pseuds/sazzafraz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>God help the Avengers. Second part of More Seats Reserved For Heroes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. turn the glass into stars

**Author's Note:**

> The clock starts ticking down.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 11:59:59

The digital face of a clock reads 12:00:00

It now reads 11:59:59.

\--

Natasha remembers this because it is only half true.

Bucky (and he’s only ‘Bucky’ now that Steve’s brushed his time travelling hands along him, now that James is broken and left on the ground a poor forgotten thing, too long broken, too well hurt) has his fingers laced through hers, palm to palm with their arms pressed close. He’s looking straight at her, eyes blue and his mouth twisted into that fucking smirk. They’re lying on the floor of a plane going down over some godforsaken land. There’s a sky and some wind and the bite of snow on her face. Her leg’s broken and someone ripped off Bucky’s arm. 

Natasha’s not new, not new at all, but she’s still scared, still so scared of what happens next, ‘Tell me this won’t hurt.’

‘Can’t. Its all gotta hurt some time.’

‘Then lie.’

Bucky smiles in a terrible way that says the time for comfort passed a long time ago, that she’s too late and really, what is she even doing here? 

‘Everythin’s fine.’ His eyes glow brighter and brighter and brighter till they’re so blue she’ll never see around them again and then-

Natasha wakes up.

\--

The Winter Solider is Natasha Romanova’s first real trainer.

Up until now she’s had world renowned gymnasts teach her to flip, twist, land, the best martial arts training, a million ‘etiquette’ lessons to scrub away whoever she might have been before training and a million bearded men with no names who grin and leer when she hits the targets. She’s a spy, the best one, a honey trap and an assassin and every shade of espionage in between. 

She does not expect him (but really who does?) and she does not realise until the third week that this training is as much about him as it is about her. Bucky Barnes comes into SHEILD in the way most do. Something classified happened and then he was inducted to avoid massive fallout. She doesn’t immediately make the flying connection to Captain America mostly he’s just the boy with the broken arm who is just as haunted as she is.

She does, eventually, make that leap.

It all falls down quickly enough. She’s knocked off the board, quits SHEILD, Matt Murdock, Clint, SHEILD and Bucky, again, shortly before Tony and Pepper. Then there are the Avengers, and she wants to tell Steve so badly but if there’s anything her training taught her it was to hold the truths that will hurt the most back. That falls too. In fact, it all falls so quietly that when she wakes up in a cabin banked in snow, a memory she pushed away  
long ago, the peace she feels is temporarily beautiful.

It doesn’t last.

It never does. 

\--

They’re all awake.

She’s in a circular room, stark white, one door in and out, no windows. She rubs a hand through her hacked off and dyed hair, wondering absently how it got this way. Being in the ‘real world’ is foggy. She can’t clearly remember anything. She leans against the door and turns on the communications system again. No one else has figured out it’s there yet and she keeps catching portions of conversation between Peter and someone she doesn’t know. Peter is kind of an idiot but he’s a nice one. Thors room is filled with a heavy silence and a language she does not speak. Clints is empty and soundless, and she tries not to panic about that, while Bruce’s has his soft snores. She switches back to Peters room.

The other man keeps rambling about a dream he had, ‘And I had this weird moment where I had this visceral understanding of what being Samuel L. Jackson is like. Standing there begging all these ponies to go the fuck to sleep.’

‘Dude. I would be the sassiest pony.’ Peter says.

The other man replies, ‘You would, man, you would.’

She sighs, smiles, and presses the button for Steve’s room.

She catches the end part of a tirade.

‘So you’re planning to execute me publically?’ Steve says.

And another voice, one she’s only heard in recordings and from black ops missions she’s barely even allowed to think about, ‘No, oh no, Captain, I plan to have you lead a revolution.’

Baron Zemo.

She tries to pry open the panel, rewire it so she can get out and help Steve. If Zemo is here...well, this is a bigger fight than even Captain America can handle.

‘What do you mean by lead a revolution?’

‘Have you looked outside, Captain? The world is as it should be.’ There’s a sound, like a chair being scraped back, ‘But I miscalculated, I suppose, there is no more conflict. No more fights and as a result of that, stagnation. 

You give people paradise and they lie down and die.’

‘Seems like a pretty big miscalculation.’ Steve says.

‘I want to give them hope.’ Zemo says, ‘I want to give them you.’

She closes her eyes. Don’t say yes, it’s a trap, it is an obvious trap.

‘If I say no?’

‘I’ll kill you and then I’ll kill everyone else.’

There’s a wail in the background and a sharp slapping noise. She can almost hear the weight of Steve thinking.

Don’t. Say. Yes.

‘Yes.’

Shit.

The door slides open and Natasha is out of it in a flash. She grabs the guard there to escort her and punches him in throat, swinging down to grab his gun. She shoots another guard in the shoulder and makes for the room next door to hers. Three steps from the door and there is a loud smash as Hulk comes barrelling through a wall. Peter and a man she does not recognise come stumbling out of a doorway, two guards behind them. She shoots both guards and turns toward another door. Thor lets out one loud bellow and all but scoops them up and makes an exit. The Hulk making his own way out and swinging himself down into the city.

From the outside of the building it’s obvious they’re still in New York. But it’s not one she’s ever seen before. It’s all broken down fallen buildings and empty streets. She can see Hydra flags flying everywhere, hear guns in the distance. It’s the end of a war and it looks like the heroes lost. The building they have just left is the only bright point, the Hydra symbol emblazed on the front and a small army circling it. Thor takes them all far and fast, making for the far edge of the city. To, she realises belatedly, an old safe house no one but Tony knew about. Peter is using all of his skills to stay plastered to Thors back, the other man hanging onto his shoulder. Natasha is under the arm not holding his hammer, painfully close to an armpit. Clint is nowhere to be seen. 

‘Where’s Clint!’ She screams into Thors’ ear.

‘I do not know. He was not brought in with us.’

She knows in her head that Clint is the one person here she doesn’t have to worry about. She knows how he fights and how he deals, he will be fine.

‘We will find him.’ Thor says. ‘Right now, Steven is in far more peril.’

Natasha takes one last look back at the Hydra building.

God help the Avengers. 

\--


	2. between the day and night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 10:34:02

When Pepper is five she wants to be a queen.

She gets this, for three months, dating Tony. At first she’d pretty much assumed it was going to be a lot of work and occasional trophy girlfriend-ing. Nothing too far from normal. Her playing keeper to her slightly more than sociopathic boss with the side benefit of fucking. As it turns out, Tony is perfectly capable of being in love with someone, he just can’t do it in any other drive than desperately.

There is a line in a poem she read once, one she wrote down on a piece of paper and handed to him when they broke up. She thought it was perfect for him and his conglomerate of tormented wanting. It’s on the tip of her tongue, it was-

\--

Pepper wakes up choking.

To be specific, she wakes up with a beautiful man smiling at her and a tube rammed down her throat. Like any normal human being she panic, arms flailing, and tries to wrench the tubing out. The man -and her mind is supplying _Bucky Barnes, Winter Solider, Friend_ as a name- presses her back down and gently pulls it out. The room she’s in is bare, just a dirty mattress and a chair in the corner, there aren’t even windows.

‘Why?’ her voice is timid, unlike her.

‘Welcome home, Pepper Potts.’ He says four parts amused, two incredulous. ‘How much wood can a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?’

‘What?’

Well that’s what she means to say but its cut short as a bell and whistles voice rams through her head.

_DreamHouse AI functioning._

The voice drops out after one clear moment, Pepper catching the tail end of her yelling, ‘What was that?!’

‘What?’

‘That voice. DreamHouse.’

‘Oh, DreamHouse.’ He rubs his nose and frowns, ‘well Ms Potts, you and me are the secret parts of the revolution.’

‘Revolu-’

_Revolution, the. A forcible overthrow of a government or social order for a new system. Revolution, the: movement to destroy the Throne and remove all DreamShare operations thereby overturning the government thereby insuring freedom. Implemented by DreamShareGroup 3 (DSG3) identification SHEILD in response to DreamShareGroup 1 (DSG1) designation HYDRA for transgressions against DreamShareGroup 2 (DSG2) identification Avengers as well as the gross treatment and imprisonment of Architect Loki and The Originator._

‘That’s fast.’

‘Yeah, we piggybacked in when we-’ he pauses, runs a hand through his hair, ‘oh, okay, don’t look down.’

Because Pepper is only human she immediately looks down. And then freaks out.

There is a very large strip of metal over where her heart should be. The surrounding edges are hugely scarred like Tonys was – _Identification Tony Stark, Iron Man, Dreamer Lost-_ and she tries very, very hard not to have a panic attack when Bucky’s arm, _his robotic arm,_ gingerly touches the flesh. It burns hot and cold, like a burn in fierce wind. His hand retreats and an almost guilty look passes over his face.

‘What did you do to my chest!’ she screams and rapidly reaches down to see what else has changed.

‘You lost a lot of, well, chest, in the attack.’

‘So you stuck a machine in there?’

‘You’re Rescue, yes?’ He says carefully, ‘DreamHouse is an AI created by Reed. You volunteered to look for the Avengers 3 weeks ago. We implemented a bastardized version of Starks mainframe combined with DreamHouse into your suit. Do you remember?’

She remembers Tony and Tony dying and Anthony slipping off the deep end and Natasha and her dreams, dancing with Bucky in a dress she hates at a broken down, drowning high school reunion, a city that is not a city four levels down and crumbling. She does not remember a revolution, ‘No I don’t.’

His face flashes with something, guilt maybe, and Pepper gets a ping in her head, like a rubber band snapping, _don’t trust him all the way, you’re missing something,_ ‘Memory sometimes lapses.’ He says, ‘I have some clothes for you.’

She takes the clothes, some black skin tight thing Nat would wear, ‘I want to know what happened.’

He nods, ‘DreamHouse, Query; Sequence of Events leading to Host, Virginia Potts, Identification Rescue, Pepper Potts, awakening here. And make it brief.’

_Define point ‘here’_

She blinks and he gives her an expectant look. ‘What did it say?’

‘Define ‘here’.’

He snorts, ‘Point ‘here’ location ‘Brooklyn’.’

 _Location verified. Information accessed. 14 months ago the United Nations fell to DSG1’s control. A dictatorship was passed under the rule of one, Baron Zemo, designation King. DSG2 responded with aggressive attacks but were caught and loaded into DreamShare, a suspended magical dream cycle, origin unknown, under the care of Architect Loki. Reed Richards, Creator, managed to slip in a backdoor program ‘_ Inception’ _before DSG2 was fully weaved into DreamShare using Tony Starks AI._ 'Inception' _spread through the entire of DreamShare._ _Using this program BSG3 has kept a close watch on BSG2. Tony Stark, Knight Errant, awoke from his suspended dream state threatening the integrity of the program. He created a loophole in the system by which instead of restarting the system, death freed the inhabitants of DSG2. In an attempt to save DSG2 Commander Fury, designation Bishop, placed the newly developed dream hack program, DreamHouse, in Host, Virginia Potts and sent it to hack DSG2 under the assumption that Virgina Potts was such a part of Tony Starks life he would not question her disruption. DreamHouse succeeded in infiltrating Tony Starks dreams but failed in its ultimate mission of making him fully aware. Trojan Horse_ ‘You Could be the Greatest Man in the World’ _loaded but not activated. Tony Starks unexpected departure from DSG2 caused Host, Virgina Potts to be weaved into the system, losing her connection to reality. SHEILD Agent James Barnes was sent into retrieve Host, Virginia Potts from HYDRA facility 3 and take her to SafeHouse 7 in Brooklyn, New York. Query?_

Query?

_Yes. Query?_

She blinks; the voice in her head wants to _chat._ Well, it can’t actually hurt at this point, can it? She thinks a simple _yes_ in her head.

_Query; there are files uploaded from DreamState1, do you wish to view or inform SHEILD Agent James Barnes?_

Pepper looks at Buckys face, the smile and the nagging feeling there is something important about him she’s forgotten. No, she thinks, she won’t tell him.

_Accepted. Query?_

Yes, she thinks, slightly amused. It's like having a curious child in her head. 

_How much wood can a woodchuck chuck?_

Pepper closes her eyes, ‘What do we do now?’

Bucky sits down on the edge of the mattress, ‘We wait. If no one comes in three days we run.’

‘Run where?’ _Run, why?_

He looks her straight in the eyes, ‘does it matter?’

‘What happened to the others?’

His jaw tightens, ‘we fought hard, almost won back most of Europe, what with everyone hating anyone telling them what to do, but Hydra sneaked in, caught all the high level officials and slipped them into DreamShare. The fighting got a lot worse after that, eventually, it seemed most of the world thought that Hydra was a better option then slowly tearing everything to pieces. He made himself look so reasonable against the chaos.’ His hand clenches on the mattress. ‘They took Steve first, then the others, Steve had been playing Poster Boy and once he was gone people just accepted it, that it was all over. There are maybe 20 superheroes left. Every single mutant on the planet is either vanished or locked behind magnetic fields on an island somewhere. The Fantastic Four are being watched in their penthouse and anyone else who even so much as whiffed of revolutionary intent is locked up in the main Hydra base. Fury and all of SHEILD too.’

She closes her eyes and lets a single tear roll down her face, it seems  like a huge thought, an impossible one, Pepper Potts was never meant for things this big, ‘It’s just us.’

He turns and places a warm hand against her cheek, stopping the tear rolling down, ‘Everything will be fine.’

She nods, rolls over, lets herself sleep.

 


	3. you called my name in the dark

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 10:00:02

 

Tony has a thing stuck in his head.

It’s an important thing, a life saving one, and if it weren’t for the dripping of water onto his face he would remember what it was that was stuck in his head.

 _‘We’ve been waiting for you for so long.’_ A voice, hissing in the silence says, _‘we missed you.’_

If only-

_‘Come home wayward son.’_

He could just figure out-

_‘The devil awaits and you have work to do.’_

What the _hell_ is going on-

_Snap_

The cherry red skull peers down at him again, ‘Welcome to hell, Mr Stark.’

‘Where am I?’ Tony asks, eyes rapidly scanning the sterile white room. No exits, just padded walls and Lord Cherry smiling at him. God, if _Steve_ had ended up looking like this-

_Steve_

Just the thought of him sends a thrill of panic through him, the reaction of his subconscious against pain that came from something wearing his face. _Well,_ Tony thinks, _that’s a way to get over it._ He tries thinking about it. Rid himself of the fear by normalisation. _Steve, Steve, Steve. Steve in my head was an asshole, Steve in my head hurt me by-_

Well, let’s face it, what didn’t id-Steve do?

It’s something to think about. That the thing he loves most and the things he fears most are so _intrinsically_ wrapped up in one another. His therapist would love to hear about this. Speaking of, if he spent that much time lost in Tonyland did he really have to pay his therapist, and all the hours he logged in that goddamn awful therapy chair, was he giving _self therapy?_

‘I do not think you are paying attention to me.’ Mr Evil Redvines says.

‘We the American people do not negotiate with terrorists.’

Mr Scarlet Asshole smiles, ‘There is no more America, Stark.’

What? ‘What?’

‘The world is Hydras now.’ He says, so goddamn pleased, like that isn’t a horrible thing to say. _The world is dead._

Well. That’s just peachy.

‘Then why aren’t I dead?’

Crimson Douchebag sighs and lifts a black leather box, he strokes it for a moment and then flips open the latch, sighing again as he lifts out a knife. It’s sharp and silver, a surgeons tool. ‘The problem with the DreamShare program is that it tends to leave memory loss in its wake. There is something you, and only you, know and we need to know it too. So cooperate Mr Stark. After all, your views have not always been so far from ours.’

‘Bullshit.’

He holds the blade, a thin thing, to the edge of a wrist. Steve –not Steve, id-Steve, had done the same thing. ‘You will remember.’

Tony feels the wave come on, that dark place he went to in Veitghanistan. The one he went to with –the place he goes when he can’t cope. 

\--

He is in a tiny cave with only the voice of a dead man, a good man, and if he wasn’t already so intimately acquainted with it he’d assume insanity was like this. Quiet, unobtrusive but always _there_ like an irreversible sickness. His hands are held down by the weight of something, it feels smooth and clean, like metal but he can’t turn his head to check. The rest of him is weightless. He remembers this feeling, of inexorable weight and weightlessness. Hello Mr Stark, welcome to PTSD, population; you.

‘I have a family waiting for me back home, Tony.’ The Good Man says, friendly and caring.

‘You’re dead.’

‘Yes,’ he says, ‘and so are they.’

‘And so am I?’

The Good Man laughs, ‘Your death was greatly misleading.’

Tony lets himself smile, ‘Excellent, always good to be a source of chatter.’

The Good Mans’ voice takes on a tired timber, sombre and deep, ‘You should leave this place. I fear you have spent too much time wandering it already.’

‘Maybe I wanted to get lost.’

‘Not all those who wander are lost.’

He pauses to consider that. For the last...however long it’s been, he’s been killing himself slowly, ripping up pieces of his identity and twisting them into something else. He’s been beaten down and bruised and dragging himself towards something. Even at his worst he’s been fighting, maybe not the way he’s supposed to, but still, fighting. Tony Stark will not die in a cave. Not even if the cave is his own stupid head.

‘What the hell am I meant to do?’

‘You’ve thought your way to the answer already. Just reach for it.’

‘I-’ He can’t finish the sentence, what _is_ he. Is he Anthony? Is he Tony? What identifying marker can he hang on to?

The answer hits like a pulse.

_I am Ironman._

_I crawled out of hell once before and I can do it again._

‘I am Ironman.’

‘Yes. You are.’ The Good Man says, pleased, ‘You are many other things too, but those can wait. Right now, you are beginning to remember, who you are and what lead here. This is dangerous, I’m sure you know, and there is a way out, and you know it already. Do not fear.’

Right, torture and existential crises, what’s to fear?

‘And if I die?’ he asks because he is a morbid little shit.

‘Then you’ll be dead,’ The Good Man says matter of a fact, ‘and I will be waiting to meet you.’

Ironman laughs, ‘Right. You’re also a figment of my imagination.’

‘Yes I am, that doesn’t change the answer.’

The Good Man disappears.

Tony does what he always seems to be doing.

He wakes up.

\--

‘You passed out Mr Stark.’ The Red Skull makes a _tisk_ noise, dlipping the knife over in his fingers, silver and blooded, ‘we’ll have to see you get better care.’

Ironman smiles, ‘I’m going to kill you.’ 

‘What?’ The Red Skull puts down his knife. The sound hits the urge to run in his brain.

_You have dragged yourself out of hell once, you can do it again._

‘I am going to kill you. I am going to escape. I am going to bring this whole thing down.’

Red Skull actually laughs, ‘You and what army?’

A Hulk. A super solider. Two assassins. A demi-god.

It must show on his face because the other man just smiles and whispers, ‘The Avengers are dead.’

He doesn’t let his shock show. Or the grief. Just thinks of The Good Man back in the cave so many years ago. _You dragged yourself out._ He is Ironman. He saved the world without them before and he can -he’ll _have to_ do it again.

‘I’m Ironman. I’ll do it myself.’

The other man just shakes his head, ‘Do try. It’ll be entertaining.’

Ironman gives him a small lazy smile, the same one he remembers wearing when he decided to build the suit, one he’s worn before every big fight and after every win. _I am going to_ ruin _you._

‘You can always count on me for entertainment.’ Ironman says, he nods at the knife, the movement jerky, ‘Weren’t you going to do something with that?’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally! To the meat of the story.


	4. the only solution was to stand and fight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 09:27:09

‘You’re playing into what he wants.’

And that would be Maria Hill, dressed in a ball gown, arguing with Fury, dressed in grumpiness and a uniform. Steve groans a little and pushes his palms against his eyeballs. They’re in a large waiting room, bare except for the flat view of New York, a desk shoved against a wall and a pair of ridiculously comfortable chairs. He’s definitely been in worse prisons. Baron Zemo’s little taunt about hope is ricocheting around his head, gaining more and more traction as it bounces from point to point. _Where are the others? Are they safe? What in the world am I going to do?_  

Hill and Fury are still arguing like they don’t know he can hear them. The room is large and long enough that he supposes Hill and Fury think maybe there conversation _isn’t_ anything but public.

‘By saying yes, you’re giving him what he wants.’ Hill yells.

‘It might be the only way to win back-’

‘There is no back.’ Hill hisses, ‘We _lost,_ it’s _over._ The best we can do is-’

‘ _That_ is not an option.’

‘Negativity never got anyone anywhere.’

‘This isn’t negativity this is practicality.’ A rustle of fabric as she repositions a weapon, ‘You can’t honestly tell me that you think we can just take over.’

‘Why not? We have weapons and people and Captain America.’

‘The man has no idea what’s going on.’

‘We can fix that.’

‘Even if he is Captain America he’s still just one man. The other Avengers are scattered, Potts is AWOL and let’s not even start on the clusterfuck that is Tony Stark.’

‘The Avengers will come back, Barnes will make sure Potts is safe.’ Fury sounds smug, ‘he doesn’t have a choice.’

‘And Stark?’

Pause. ‘You didn’t see what I saw.’

‘With all due respect, sir-’

‘You know Hill, every time you start a conversation like that we almost come to blows, why do you think that is?’

‘ _Sir._ ’

‘Enough.’ Steve says, lifting his head out of his hands, ‘What do I need to know?’

‘In around 9 hours Baron Zemo is throwing a little party. We will crash that party.’

‘Okay. That’s what I need to know, now what aren’t you telling me?’ Steve catches his eye, makes him say it to his face.

Fury and Hill exchange a few tense looks. Finally, Hill says, ‘It’s a trap. Zemo knows it’s coming. We won’t win.’

‘It’s our only option.’

‘It’s the only option _you_ approve of.’

‘Does the chain of command mean anything to you?’

‘You said Barnes.’

‘Yes,’ Hill blinks and says, ‘was Agent Barnes not...?’

There’s a cataclysm of emotion in his head. A tiny voice that says _Bucky’s alive_ but then whispers, _Bucky’s not safe,_ ‘I thought he was dead.’

Fury makes an unhappy sound, ‘Not so. He’s been working as a long term undercover agent for SHEILD for awhile. But that’s a story I’ll tell you some other time. We’ve got him out doing rescue work.’

‘And Pepper?’ Steve asks. What will he tell Nat if she’s dead?

‘Pepper Potts, well, you’re not going to believe me.’

So Fury tells him, about Bucky and the ice, about the world crumbling, about DreamShare and DreamHouse and about Pepper and Rescue. There are holes, of course, because Fury has never trusted anyone enough for a _full_ debriefing but there’s enough that Steve can feel a plan working into his head. The way he sees it they’ve got a few options, all more terrible than the last. He can play to Zemo’s game and hope that he slips up and gives Steve something he can _really_ work with. He can try and force his way out, bring an upfront battle but that has the drawback of being both planned for and wildly suicidal. He could try and figure out the secret Fury is keeping but that’s like opening a box of cats with only one tin of tuna in a closed room. The best chance, the only real one, is to coordinate with the Avengers on the outside. Zemo might know who they’ve been, but he doesn’t know who they are now. There’s a new level of ferocity and viciousness he can feel inside himself, from where the dreams ran over the worst parts of him. He’s seen it in the others too. 

There’s a monster down there where he was screaming. A horrible thing that whispers the worst he could be right in his face. Steve has always been told he was a good man. Seeing the evidence that he might not be, having that drag its claws and whisper all the things he wants and wants to do, _that_ is the most effective form of torture. Steve is more than familiar with PTSD, with shaking nightmares and trigger flashes of pain and panic, but there is a memory, not of something he did but of something _he did to someone else_ that scares him more than anything. Steve is values and hope and good things. The idea that he might not be is terrifying.

‘Do you have a way of communicating with the outside?’

Hill nods, ‘Yes, but its slow.’

‘It only needs to be two words.’

‘He’s watching us. We can’t afford to give our plan away.’ Hill makes a pointed look toward the corners of the room.

Steve nods, ‘That’s exactly what I want.’

Hill blinks at him and Steve bites down on the urge to laugh.  

‘I wear a blue, white and red suit Ms Hill. Covert was never my speciality.’ Steve taps the star on his chest, ‘Zemos point is to give people hope and then make the world watch as he crushes it. Wiping out any chance of a true revolution. I think he’s wildly underestimating the strength of the human spirit.’

Hill snorts, ‘That’s nice, but now is not the time for sentiment. We need a full proof plan-’

‘No, now is exactly the time for sentiment. Are there still TV’s, radios, things like that?’

‘Yes, we can patch into a national station from a room three floors down.’ Hill stands and walks over to a desk, pulls out a schematic of the building. Laying the blue and grey paper out and pointing a room tucked at the end of a long narrow corridor. One point of entry. It’ll make it easier to defend but hell if they’re captured.

‘Good.’ He searches the room and comes up with a pen and a piece of paper, folds it in half, writes three lines on the outside and two words on the inside, ‘send this to this address.’

Fury looks it over, ‘You’re sure this’ll get to them?’

‘I know my team, sir. I trust them.’

‘How many people do we have?’

‘You, me, Hill and a half dozen highly trained SHEILD agents.’

He glances at the plans again, making corrections and accounting for not knowing the terrain or the people, ‘Hill will take two agents and cause a distraction, I’ll take the other four and strong arm my way down. There’s an elevator shaft that runs right by that corridor we’re trying to get to. Once we get in we’re going to have a hell of a time keeping ground,’ he gestures to Fury, ‘that’s where you come in. You probably know more about this base then the person who built it.’

Fury gives him an amused smile, ‘An argument could be made.’

‘I need you to sabotage _everything._ ’

Fury tilts his head, ‘To what end, Captain. You’ll get a few minutes at best to make your little speech.’

Steve really doesn’t have time for this game, ‘Zemo has already screwed up. The one real weapon we have in this fight is image and if there’s anything I can do, anything we can _both_ do, it’s image.’

‘I like your thinking,’ Fury says, and _here_ it is, necessary posturing to make sure Steve remembers who the man with the cards is, ‘but what I don’t like is your assumption that I’ll blindly follow you. I like you, Rogers, more than I like most people, but I don’t trust you.’

‘Oh?’ Steve says, unsurprised.

‘There’s more going on then I’m telling you, that we both know, but has it occurred to you yet that maybe I haven’t told you for a damn good reason?’

‘No, sir, it hasn’t.’ 

Fury walks to the door, pauses, nods a tiny bit and smirks, ‘Good.’

He gives himself a firm ten seconds to hope for the others safety. A few more to pray for his own. He stands and shrugs his shield onto his back. He can hear people outside the door, the SHEILD operatives presumably.

Steve breathes in and out slowly. Then he pulls his cowl on and walks into the fight. 


	5. this is our luck, baby, running out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 08:23:22

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so sorry for how late this is, and for the person who messaged me about other means of contact [here is my tumblr](http://slowtakedowns.tumblr.com/) and yes, its empty currently, but will soon be filled with Avengers and this particular universe related nonsense.

Thor and Peter are planning a full frontal attack on the main Hydra base and for the last 3 hours all Natasha has been able to say is no, absolutely not and don’t commit suicide unless it’s a team decision. She’s not winning.

‘This is a terrible plan.’ Bruce says on the second floor balcony of their safe house. It turns out that their original safe house has long since been taken over by Hydra hordes and they’d relocated to a secondary one that Johnny, of Fantastic Four fame, swore up and down was uncompromised. Peter and Johnny have been attached at the hip ever since they woke up. It’s skirting between being irritating and being adorable.

‘You got a better idea?’

‘No, but I’m the only person here not even remotely scared of you.’

She doesn’t say, _no shit, you’re you_ but it’s a damn close thing. Bruce, if given time enough, is someone she may grow fond of. She likes his darkness and his monsters and that he has never treated her as anything less than a threat, no spunky bullshit or long stares at the suit. It hasn’t happened yet, hasn’t caught, she’s been too busy with other shit. She’s comfortable enough with herself to admit that she spends 60% of their interactions watching him for cracks.

‘Thor’s not scared of me.’ There’s a bird flying lazy circles around one of the buildings, a hawk.

‘ _Thor_ is both terrified and humbled by your ability to turn everyone around you into a blathering idiot.’

‘Men are easy.’

‘I don’t think anyone’s fighting you on that.’

They fall silent and the pause is long enough and comfortable enough that she feels no rush to break it.

‘So.’ Bruce says, leaning on the railing and looking at her from slightly hooded eyes. Hopefully not a seduction technique.

‘So.’ She says back.

‘Clint. Are you okay?’

‘No.’ she says, forces herself to continue, ‘But I’ll make do.’

‘We could talk.’

‘Strangely enough, I don’t think we’re huge talkers.’

Bruce snorts. ‘Right. It couldn’t be that bad.’

‘I’ve had enough people rummage through my head for a lifetime.’ She pauses, maybe time to connect, ‘but thank you for asking.’

He smiles at her, nods and turns to leave. He stops and frowns. He points to the side of a building and a small flashing light, ‘What the hell is that?’

‘We should be cautious. Last guy who turned up on a bike had anger management problems.’

‘Is that who I think it is?’

A man emerges from the shadows, still flashing a light and she thinks _oh morse code_ before thinking _he really needs to learn to distinguish his vowels._ The man is injured heavily on his shoulder, clothes tattered, covered in blood and some sort of slime. There’s a bow slung across his shoulder, pressing down and leaving marks, his eyes are swollen and there’s a minor gunshot wound around his left knee. Clint Barton, impossible to kill.

Bruce leaves immediately; Natasha stays for ten seconds longer, just in case he’s got a tail. By the time she gets downstairs he’s being treated by Peter and Thor is handing him a glass of water.

‘Clint!’ Bruce shouts, ‘What happened?’

He blinks, too slow, disorientated, ‘Long story and I’d like to be not covered in, well, this, when I tell you.’

Clint showers and she can safely say it is one of the tensest 15 minutes of her life. What’s going on, what are our orders, _what is going on?_ Clint re-emerges, grabs an MRE and sets about eating it. He’s beaten up, he’s not even trying to hide his shoulder injury and it’s obvious enough he’s eating without tasting. Eating like a soldier.

‘Well?’ she asks.

So Clint talks. About Fury and what he knows and what he’s discovered. There’s a resistance but it’s failing, they have one shot at Zemo and its in less than 8 hours, it will fail if they can’t get Coulson out in the next three, someone needs to send out a signal so the others will know when to attack. Clint takes a long drink of water and makes a sharp gesture to her. They’re all gathered around a table. Looking at an array of maps and photos of both the buildings they’ll need to infiltrate.

‘So what’s the game plan?’

‘Excuse me?’

‘Nat,’ Clint says, _Naaaaaaaat,_ like she’s an idiot, _Naaaaaaaat,_ like he doesn’t know exactly what he’s about to do, ‘you’re in charge.’

‘Am I?’

‘Next most leadership experience.’

Fuck, okay, not at all where she expected this to go. She’s a spy not a-

Shit, she doesn’t even know if she’s a spy.

‘Fine. You said they’re holding him here.’ She points to a building circled in red, ‘we leave here and we don’t have a base.’

Clint makes a face.

‘Do we have a base Clint?’ she asks neutrally.

He licks his lips, ‘If we can win it.’

Right, win or die, excellent.

She turns to the side and looks at Bruce, ‘ _This_ is a terrible plan.’

Bruce gives her a sad half smile.

She looks at the map and the photos properly. The building is a nightmare to attack and to defend. It’s in the middle of what is now a large housing area. There are camps, houses, businesses, hundreds of displaced people living within 500 metres of the building. Only three viable entry and exit points none of which she likes the look of. One is too high and the others are high visibility.  On the plus side, the guards are stationed far enough away, on the outside of the community, that it would be near impossible for them to get close fast enough to stop them should they manage to get inside. It’s hard to tell if the placement of the base was purposeful or if the community immerged on its own. She makes a few extra plans, adjustments in case any of them are compromised or captured. Satisfied she turns back to the group.

‘Here’s how we’re going to play it,’ she points to each team member in turn. ‘Thor, you’ll mount an aerial distraction, take me and Bruce to the top of the building then get the guards to pay attention to you. Do whatever you have to but get them away from the left side of the building. Clint and Peter, you will sneak through the side and grab Coulson. Bruce and I will enter through the top and disable security. Thirty seconds from when Thor drops me on to the building you must be at the side entrance, thirty seconds from that you must be at these doors and 5 minutes after that you must be leaving with the target, understood.’ She gets a firm nod from Clint, a salute from Peter and a grim acknowledgment from Thor. Bruce says nothing but purses his lips slightly, ‘After we retrieve Coulson I want Thor to demolish the security. Let everyone in, we’ll use it as a distraction to get to this room,’ she draws a circle around a room in the far corner of the building, ‘it’s a safe room, minimal entrances but several exits. We’ll plan from there. Everyone clear?’

‘One question,’ Peter says, ‘Say this goes terribly and we all get dead?’

‘Then we’ll be dead.’ Clint answers, already checking his arrows.

They disassemble after that. Bruce and Thor to find some food, Peter to talk to his friend. It’s just her and Clint for a solid fifteen seconds, looking at each other eye to eye. Clint breaks eye contact and tries to shuffle past her to leave.

‘Clint.’ She grabs his arm and pauses him in the doorway. This has to be messing him up, especially after Loki’s little fun time in his head.

He smirks, avoids eye contact and she feels a tremor in his muscle, ‘We’ll get this done and then you can strap me down and eviscerate my manhood with feelings.’

She smiles, weakly, and lets him go. He knows he can trust her and that’s what actually matters, ‘I’ve never been like that.’

‘Eviscerate me in general then.’ He gives her a wicked grin and a half assed salute. ‘See you at the finish line, _sir_.’

\--

Everything goes to shit.

Well, they get in, Coulson gets out and _then_ everything goes to shit.

Thor gets shot down in the civilian rush to get inside the building. Peter gets separated from Clint in their escape. She knows Clint got to the safe room and that’s easing a little worry. They’re okay, a little roughed up on her part and Bruce is going a little Green. He’s staying calm and she doesn’t regret the decision to keep him with her just in case.

Right now they’re running through the building, looking for her secondary exit –a truck that will take them all the way to the main Hydra base and hopefully to Steve. They’re three corridors away from the exit, about to enter a docking bay full of supplies being shipped over to the main Hydra base. Bruce is panting; she’ll have to talk to Steve about his cardio. You can’t rely on your superpower.

Bruce grabs her shoulder; she barely remembers not to hit him, ‘The others-’ he says and they’re really going to have to have a talk about trust and perception if he thinks they can’t hold their own.

‘Can handle themselves, they know where to go and what’s happening.’ _To the degree that any of them do._ ‘I had a second plan in case this happened.’

‘In case what happened?’

There’s a guard at the end of the corridor. Pushing Bruce behind her she pulls out a knife and aims for his shoulder, the moment she flings the knife she starts running. The guard jerks to raise his gun just as the knife lands; she falls onto her knees a few feet before she reaches him and slides underneath removing the gun from its holster and coming to stand on her feet again. She points the gun and fires one shot into his leg. It won’t kill him.

She gestures at Bruce to keep moving, ‘If we couldn’t all get to the safe room I found an alternative means of exit for you and me to make sure that someone got to the Hydra base  in time to take the shot at Zemo.’

Standing to the side of the door she cracks it open and sneaks a peak. No immediate threats.

‘You brought me? Why?’

‘Because you save people and we need that right now.’

He scowls, ‘You all have too much faith in me.’

‘Look at us. Really look. I don’t know if this is real or if it’s another dream, the one thing I can even begin to trust right now is _this team._ ’ Grabbing his hand, she pulls him through and into a wide, white room. Trucks and cars are parked near the far end, a series of cargo boxes conveniently planted between them and a truck, the guards sitting loosely at a few vital points. The security is terrible. They move quickly behind the cargo boxes stopping every thirteen steps to check for guards, it takes 39 steps to get to the truck and no one so much as glances toward them,‘So I have faith and so should you.’ 

There’s a series of tubes strapped to the back of the truck, long and white and about 15 ft long and very narrow, closed on either end by latched doors. She can’t imagine what they’d be used for. They’ll fit but it’ll be cramped. She unlatches one and gestures at Bruce to enter. He raises one eyebrow in a wealth of politely masked aloofness. Bruce’s shoulders are already almost too wide to fit in, that’s obvious without looking.

A guard comes almost within sight of them. She points the gun at him and then at the latch. The eyebrow rises even higher.   

He holds the door open, half in, half in her way, ‘You’re not as bad at this as you think you are.’

‘Shut up and get in the tube.’

Bruce hesitates before he crawls in. She gets his reluctance. If you regularly turn into the giant green thing from rage deeps suddenly discovering claustrophobia could be bad. She swings in after him, carefully closing the door.

She gets a foot and a half in before she realises something’s different. She’s militant about things like this, tracking her PTSD and managing her own head, but something’s changed. Something _hurts_ in a way it never has before. Her vision dyes red and gray at the edges, her hands shake twice before she stops them, her breathing shallows out.

_Claustrophobia._

When did she become afraid of being trapped?

‘Now what?’ Bruce asks when they’re a solid 10 feet in.

She holds a shaking hand to her chest and counts back and forth to ten in every language she knows.

‘Now we wait.’

 


End file.
